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Michael6945c

Michael6945c

Jack Dempsey
MFK Member
Mar 15, 2012
365
30
31
Dayton, Ohio
My dad's aquarium had a 10 inch Oscar, 6 inch jag, and now a dead synodontis lace catfish. He's been skipping on his water changes for about 2 weeks, and yesterday he finally did his water change, and replace one of his two filters and removed a decoration due to the fishes growing size. This morning, he found the catfish dead, and both the jag and Oscar are laying at the bottom, rarely moving. Our water is pretty soft, ph is 7.2, nitrites are 0, ammonia 0, and nitrates are 20. The oscars left eye is also becoming cloudy, so I'm fearing cloudy eye but don't want to dump meds on him until I know for sure. I also turned off the lights to relieve stress but still minimal movement.


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possible a chemical got in during water change? If you can get alot of activated carbon in some type of filter do that. a very large water change would be best but it may stress them too much. you could do multiple 20% water changes.
 
Could have had a spike in ammonia or nitrites from removing a filter and a decoration (taking away the beneficial bacteria colonies).

I have had to skip a WC every now and then and that doesn't really harm anything unless you're running a severely overstocked tank.

Also do you use tap/city water? I ask because I've noticed that in the spring and fall that the water facilities will sometimes do a flush to their systems and add in extra chemicals that aren't really fish friendly.
 
I was thinking pH crash, or ammonia poisoning from stirring up the substrate, but all your params are fine. Was a dechlorinator used on the new water?
 
Still not sure what happened, but the jag is alright now, the Oscar want from breathing slowly and not moving to still not moving and gasping at the bottom. Aeration in the tank is fine so I'm not sure why he's gasping. Anything I can add to the aquarium to help?


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After further looking and the Oscar finally turning around I found cloudy white stringy stuff attached to the Oscar and some parts of the sand. Not sure if its slime coat or fungus? But I bought pimafix. Not sure where fungus would have come from though, except for I know that some things can grow under the right conditions and lack of water changes may have created those conditions. As for the heavy breathing, I'm guessing maybe the fungus or slime coat got into his gills? I wanna treat the water but I need approval from someone a little more experienced with sickness and no one is really posting on my topics. I'm really asking for help on this, so please post.


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Well I gave the fish the pimafix.... I had to do something so I did a 25% water change before I gave the meds. Hopefully I didn't kill him by doing this.. I figure he's got a small chance of survival, but if he's gonna die it'll be tonight or tomorrow..


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